Uncategorized

Good grief, the health beat is busy this week! Some short reports: Wal-Mart announced yesterday that it will soon offer a 30-day supply of nearly 300 generic medicines for just $4 each. Target quickly followed, and surely Walgreens and others will be close behind. Who says that competition doesn't work? Wal-Mart's program is starting in Tampa Bay and will include the entire state of Florida by … [Read more...] about A Lively Week

The Commonwealth Fund once again is making headlines with a new study that says people with individual health insurance policies pay more, get less, have higher deductibles, and are less happy with their coverage than those with job-based plans. This certainly would seem to undermine confidence in private health insurance. But America's Health Insurance Plans immediately countered that the … [Read more...] about Apples and Oranges

The National Health Service decided to do a survey of how well general practitioners in the U.K. are complying with pay-for-performance guidelines, and Health Affairs reports that the GPs surprised government authorities with a 91% compliance score. But it's not surprising if you believe in incentive economics: The docs received points for following the clinical guidelines, and each point earned a … [Read more...] about Patients, Doctors, and Governments

The Census Bureau's new report shows a steady uptick in the number of people without health insurance (46.6 million) and a steady decline in the percentage of people with job-based health insurance (down to 59.5% this year). With many employers priced out of the health insurance market and with an increasingly mobile workforce, it is vital that policy changes be made to give people more … [Read more...] about Vacation's Over

Former HHS Secretary Tommy Thompson offered his prescription for a "Medicaid Makeover" during a speech last weekend to the National Governors Assn. meeting in Charleston, SC. Some ideas are good and some not. The not-so-good: As a former governor of Wisconsin, Gov. Thompson knows well the strains that Medicaid is putting on state budgets. His solution is to have the federal government take over … [Read more...] about Under the Radar

It's been three years since the hot summer when the House and the Senate debated and then passed bills to create the new Medicare prescription drug benefit. And yet the battles still rage. A new study in Health Affairs says that "Seniors give Part D mixed reviews, and majorities are less satisfied with Medicare and with the government as a result of their experience with this program." (Two of … [Read more...] about Growing Pains

In my reading of the tea leaves over what's coming in the health reform debate, I am worried about what I see. Three examples: Momentum is building for big labor to join with corporate America to shove more health costs on to the American taxpayer. The most recent preview of this initiative came from Andy Stern, head of the Service Employees International Union, in a commentary in The Wall … [Read more...] about Tea Leaves

Three cheers for Judge Motz, the federal District judge who ruled Wednesday against Maryland's misguided law targeting Wal-Mart with a health coverage mandate. Experts had said all along that the Maryland law, enacted earlier this year over Gov. Ehrlich's veto, would not meet the Erisa test, and that is exactly what the judge said. Erisa allows companies to have employee benefit plans that are … [Read more...] about Wisdom Prevails